Faces of Our Faith – Week 1 (4.18.21)
We begin a new series this Sunday which invites us to look at a number of biblical characters who are often overlooked. Their stories, although obscure, are instructive for our lives.
We begin a new series this Sunday which invites us to look at a number of biblical characters who are often overlooked. Their stories, although obscure, are instructive for our lives.
Discerning our vocation can be aided by considering a unique intersection. Where does our deep gladness, the world’s deep hunger and the work of God’s Spirit intersect? We explore this together by looking at Luke 10 and the sending of the 70.
As we continue a look at the the idea vocation, we consider the end goal. What is every calling and vocation leading us toward? Luke 4:1-21
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In our final week of this series we look back on the last four weeks and consider an idea that makes all the others possible: I need you.
One of the most destructive voices in our lives is the voice of shame. Shame tells us that we’ll never be enough — that there’s no way we are worthy of love. If people only knew the real us…
The Scriptures speak to us not with a voice of shame, but compassion. In a story from Luke 15, we see shame at work in the lives of two brothers. The way out is to listen to the words of their father. Can we do the same?
This week we look at Acts 15 and 1 Corinthians 18 — windows into how some of the first Jesus followers navigated disagreement. This is a critical topic today as our handling of disagreement, both personally and societally is dysfunctional at best. Where do we need to grow so that disagreement becomes a transformative opportunity?
Showing up is an incredible act of strength. To show up as we are, with what we have, takes great courage and vulnerability. And…and…showing up is what is required to grow, heal and be changed.
https://anchor.fm/the-branch/embed/episodes/Stories-of-unexpected-Strength—Week-1-ep80h0
Strength is typically through of as muscle and grit — it leads to success — it’s powerful and bold. And while that is true, this view of strength is one-dimensional. What makes a person strong is more than muscle or a superior intellect. Strength comes in unexpected ways; ways our world may even tell us are weakness.
Join us as we look at a number of stories from the Scriptures of (unexpected) Strength.
This is week 1 in a five-week series.
Week 4 of our Advent series
Week 3 of Advent brings the theme of joy, something that has often felt in short supply this year.
The lectionary text (Luke 1:39-55) invites us to consider how joy might find its beginnings in anticipation of what is to come; in faith and trust in a promise made.
Those who dream God’s dreams not only heed the call to stay awake (week 1) but also to prepare the way. We look at Isaiah 40 and Psalm 85 (two of this week’s lectionary texts) and then reflect together what it might mean for us to make straight a highway for God.
The first week of Advent brought a Sunday filled with the art of A Sanctified Art and the lectionary texts of Mark 13 and Psalm 80 as we focused on the need to stay awake through the practice of lament.
Those we disagree with — those who offend us — those who are our ‘enemy’ — create great discomfort, unease and even hurt. And it seems quite human to try to avoid these things when they arise; to do our best to wall ourselves off from the discomfort. But what would happen if we did exactly the opposite?
As we look at sections of Matthew 7 and 5 we see Jesus calling us to look inward. To ask what the discomfort may have to teach us. To carefully reflect on what may be in our ‘eye’ — to pray for our enemy (an act that does a great deal to change us). Yes, it’s radical, but if lived into, it could change us, and the world.
During this week we consider how we might work to find commonality — a transformative work that can lead us to greater compassion for our enemy/other, and even the possibility of collaboration.
This week we lean into Luke 10:25-35 and Christena Cleveland’s book, Disunity in Christ, to consider the ways we categorize each other, how it causes so much damage, and a possible alternative as we work to live into God’s new humanity.
Last week we considered our shared identity as a starting point for loving our enemies. This week, we build on that identity by considering the call to humility. What does humility look like? What might we do and say if we embodied humility more greatly?